Secular Thursday isn’t popular with everyone. Of course, there’s the objection from the non-secular set, but even within the self-identifying secular homeschooling community, people have taken issue with the idea of Secular Thursday. I’ve received comments with a varying degree of tone (ranging from holier-than-thou to passive aggressive to downright nasty) from people who think Secular Thursday is too negative, that the goal is to offend or mock people with other views, that we’re making a mountain out of a molehill when we say it’s hard to find materials and support for a secular viewpoint in homeschooling.

You know, sometimes our posts can be negative. Many aspects of the world seem stacked against a secular education, favoring religion over scientific evidence. Sometimes, however, our posts are downright joyful. Sometimes we do have to mock or poke fun a little bit — it’s a natural response to the attitude that we, the secular/non-religious, are morally lacking or inferior, that because we don’t choose in include God in our curricula, that our children are growing up without guidance or character. It’s hard to live in a world comprised of people who think we’re going to hell; if we need to blow off a little steam, what of it? As my Momma puts it, you can get glad in the same pants you got mad in.

It hasn’t gotten any easier to not be a Christian in this country. It’s not getting any easier. Religion still has a too-strong hold on our laws. We live in a country where a pharmacist can deny a woman’s access to life-saving medication because he thinks she might have had an abortion, where gay people are denied the right to marry or adopt children because it offends someone’s narrow view of the fantasy of “traditional” marriage, where science texts are rewritten to include the decided non-scientific Creationist/Intelligent Design beliefs and history texts are rewritten to gloss over the ugly bits…well, don’t tell me that being secular in general — let alone a secular homeschooler, let along a secular homeschooler in the South — is always easy-peasy and that we’re practically dripping with support.

Secular Thursday is my way of reminding myself that I’m not alone in this. I’m not the only one who feels on the “outside,” who is frustrated by what I see on the “inside,” who would like access to a wider range of materials, who would like access to a wider range of groups and services, who sometimes feels like the world might be going to hell in a handbasket (if you happen to believe in hell, which I don’t), or who just plain wants to talk about stuff that the majority of the folks on the WTM forums don’t want to hear about and can’t behave themselves if you do talk about it. I’m not alone. All of these folks are with me:

• Smrt Mama at Smrt Lernins @smrtlernins
• Patchfire at A Little Rebellion @patchfire
• Rational Jenn @rationaljenn
• Cara at Peanuts are EVIL… @nolamom76
• Bobbi at My Little Soapbox @mylittlesoapbox
• Sarah at Raising Three Thinkers @raisingthinkers
• Lesa at Free K-12 Education @SimplisticLivin
• Renae at Home Education Family
• Luna at Spiral Goddess Home School @lunaskye
• WildIris at By The Way
• Crunchy Mama at The Diosa Dotada Endeavor
• Kim at Embracing My Chaos
• Queen Bee at Lost Persons Homeschool
• Lili at The Neustel Way
• Debbie at School Bytes
• verpaix at Le vert, couleur de la paix @vertpaix
• Meghan at Strader Spiel
• Heather at This Adventure Life
• Dysfuntional Homeschooler
• Julie at Creekside Learning
• Mummy Snow at Snowflakes in the Valley
• Samantha at The Scientific Homeschooler
• justamouse at just a mouse house
• Natalie at Homeschool for Two
• Siggi at Turkeydoodles

If you aren’t on this list and want to be, let me know. If you’ve become disenchanted with the idea of Secular Thursday and want off the list, let me know. If you want to bitch about Secular Thursday, you go right on ahead; it doesn’t hurt my feelings, but it sure doesn’t change my mind. If you aren’t sure what you think about Secular Thursdays, read about it. Read through my Secular Thursday posts, read through Patchfire’s, read through the others on the list. Our points of view are as varied as yours.

I think she misses the mark on a few points (for instance, I don’t believe it’s anger, but a search for “tribal” camaraderie in an overall non-Secular homeschool world, that drives most of us to participate in Secular Thursday), but she took the time to address this issue with great care and has invited polite discussion on it. I do think she hit the nail rather squarely on the head by pointing out that “secular” seems to translate too often to “atheist” or “anti-religious,” rather than “not overtly or specifically religious” (the definition she uses in her post and the one that I follow), leaving those of us that believe in something, but who don’t make that something the focus of our academic exploration, out in the cold.

I hope you’ll take her up on her invitation to participate in a conversation on secular homeschooling. Share why you’re a secular homeschooler (or why you aren’t), why you participate in Secular Thursday (or why you don’t), how you address issues of religion, secularity, etc. (or how you don’t).

ETA: I really wanted this to be the dialogue she requested, but apparently she’s only interested in a conversation with those whose opinions match her own, sadly. I see several great comments from you guys, but no responses.

He also got started with his KidCoder computer programming curriculum today. It was mostly vocabulary and background information on hardware, software, languages, systems, etc., but he was so excited to get going! We got it as a last-minute buy through the Homeschool Buyers Co-op and seems to have been worth the money. Officer Daddyman is helping him with this one.

Captain Science is also using some great computer program Daddyman downloaded to make the cards for his Pantheon Project, which didn’t really get worked on much over the summer, despite our best intentions. Captain S and Daddyman have developed a neat system for the game, a sort of rummy-style 2-4 player game. Anyone interested in playtesting it once it’s finished?

All the information on Captain Science that I could possibly require, that is.

Captain Science isn’t the only one who started homeschooling this year. This year, as my blog subtitle indicates, has also been an educational process for me. No one requires any sort of report on what I’ve learned, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t take the time to assess it. So, what has Smrt Mama McLernins learned about homeschooling (and herself) this year? What did I learn about being a secular classical homeschooler?

1. Color-coded schedules: what works and what doesn’t. Our color-coded schedule was a great idea in theory, but didn’t work out so well in execution. Too tightly scheduled, not enough time for transitions, and not enough flexibility for Captain Science. He needs more control over his order of activities. Next year’s schedule will still be time-blocked, because that really does help us get through our day in a timely manner, but it will be color coded into “core subjects,” “electives,” etc. and Captain Science will be able to choose the order in which he does his work, and more transitional time will be provided. For example, on Mondays we’d have three one-hour blocks for “school work,” separated by 15 minute breaks, followed by a half-hour lunch, another one hour block of work, then piano. Tank’s schedule would be broken up more and be in shorter blocks, with synced lunches.

2. We had an unacceptable dearth of hands-on stuff. We did so little of this and I really regret that. Projects, crafts, etc. need to be pre-planned and scheduled into our week. Other than writing samples, we have very little to physically show for our school year. No fridge art, no dioramas or whatever to display. This simply will not fly, especially next year, when my artsy little Tank is homeschooling with us. We need specifically blocked-out times for arts and crafts and we need to integrate a physical component into our history lessons. I don’t think we need to make sugar cube pyramids or anything like that, but we do need to find some more hands-on methods of doing lessons.

3. Captain Science owns his work, not me. I am one damn impatient woman. Impatient for Captain Science to get through his work quickly, impatient for him to do it the right way the first time, impatient for him to put in maximum effort rather than half-assing it. On Dawdlin’ Days, it’s all I can do to not just scream “OH MY GOD, just finish your dang WORK already!” at him, whilst running around and tearing at my hair and possibly taking up chain smoking. Ultimately, I’m not the one who controls how quickly he finishes the work. I’m not the one who controls how well he finishes the work. I can set time limits and repercussions for violating those limits. I can set standards for the work and have him redo it when he doesn’t meet those standards. At the end of the day, though, I can’t make him do something in a timely manner or with a high level of quality…or at all. Deep breath. Release. Provide guidance. Provide boundaries. Provide repercussions. Trust him.

4. Broad but shallow or narrow but deep? Did we spend too little time on each of too many subjects at a time? Did we spend too much time on too few subjects? Officer Daddyman and I have discussed this and in looking back over the past year, I see that we had periods of both. We started out with too much focus on history. It dominated our day, our life, our house! While classical homeschooling is typically history-centric, we were sacrificing other subjects just to drag out history. We also had a point where we were trying to cover 6+ subjects in a day, which meant that we couldn’t put any quality time into each subject. One way we dealt with this was by streamlining the subjects. For example, instead of three or four small language arts segments covering different things (grammar, vocabulary, writing), we switched to Michael Clay Thompson’s language arts curriculum, which integrated or coordinated those areas.

5. What’s popular isn’t always right, but it sometimes is. I probably won’t be buying into Sonlight or Math U See any time soon, no matter how many people sing their praises, but I wish I’d listened to the other parents on the advanced learner/gifted forum sooner. I know that I initially scoffed at how everyone was jumping on board the MCT train…oh, aren’t they trendy? Then I saw a video of Mr. Thompson talking about giftedness and why/how it should be nurtured, and I realized that his curriculum wasn’t popular because it was trendy, but because he had really clued in to some essential elements of giftedness. What other curricula have I dismissed due to its popularity that, in retrospect, I might discover could be a great fit for us. I won’t let a curriculum’s popularity/trendiness keep me from checking it out.

6. Friends in unlikely places. I thought that I’d find my home in the secular homeschooling community. As my many posts about feeling alienated or out of place would indicate, this wasn’t the case. I did, to my surprise, find some wonderful friends in the Christian homeschooling community. Despite vast differences in our personal lives, our specific academic materials, and our spiritual/philosophical beliefs, the many things we do share has given me a true sense of community. I also thought that it would be in the academic homeschooling community that I’d make my friends, but I could several unschoolers among the ranks of my Sisters in Homeschooling. I can’t even list all the wonderful (mostly) women (and a few men) I have encountered in the homeschool community…from all walks of life. In the end, it’s hasn’t been about secular or Christian, classical or unschooling, but about commonality of humor, respect for each other and our children, and a belief that we each want to do what is best for our children. If we don’t have humor as parents and homeschoolers, what do we have?

7. It’s ok to quit the stuff that isn’t working (before you hit crisis/loathing stage). A curriculum isn’t a marriage, right? I’ve had to learn and relearn this one. In October, I wrote about how much we loved Writing Strands and by January, I was writing about how much I disliked it. How many months of that time in between did I force us to keep on with an increasingly incompatible curriculum? I don’t know for sure, but next year, I will give myself permission to quite before I have to write a big dramatic post about how much I hate said curriculum. I promise. This time, I really will.

8. I don’t totally suck at this. Captain Science learned a lot this year. I learned a lot this year. We still like each other. Daddyman and I still like each other. The world hasn’t collapsed, the house hasn’t burned down, and I haven’t had a nervous breakdown. We not only can do this, we ARE doing this! We’re really, truly homeschoolers…and we’re doing just fine.

Many homeschoolers rely on public libraries for part or all of their materials. Public libraries can provide a perfectly valid way of cutting monetary cost while homeschooling. Depending on the size of your library system, the speed at which books can be ordered from other locations in the system, and your ability/willingness to travel frequently to the library to order, check out, and/or renew books (some systems allow online ordering and renewal), the library may be a useful part of your homeschool year…or it might be more trouble than it’s worth.

Adrienne Furness even wrote a book for librarians whose libraries see a high volume of homeschoolers, Helping Homeschoolers in the Library. Adrienne also has a website called Homeschooling and Libraries with great resources for both homeschoolers using the library and librarians assisting homeschoolers. Denise G. Masters also has some suggestions for ways library systems can become more accommodating to homeschoolers. If your library system doesn’t currently have any of these systems or protocols in place, find out if there’s someone you can speak with to start implementing some of these changes.

If your budget is significantly constrained, you have free and easy access to a great public library system, and your homeschooling philosophies/methods don’t call for a lot of consumable materials, the library may be just the ticket for you. My personal experiences have not made me into a huge library-for-homeschool enthusiast, however. I’m of the opinion that buying your own copies of materials is almost always worth it. Libraries aren’t my first choice for homeschool materials for many reasons, such as:

1. Time is money, especially with multiple children. Using the library as a source for all or most of your homeschool materials can greatly decrease the monetary cost of homeschooling, but the trade off is a potentially huge increase in the time cost of homeschooling. Every minute spent driving to and from the library is a minute that can’t be spent elsewhere. Every minute spent trying to locate the books on a library shelf (sometimes being thwarted when the book isn’t actually there) is a minute that isn’t going to actually reading the books in question. Can this time be well spent on these endeavors? Well, sure, if you can carefully plan your week around your library time. As each of my children begins homeschooling, however, I suspect our time is going to become an increasingly valuable resource, one that I can’t see spending on a lot of library back-’n-forth. I can order books online at night, during snack/lunch time, or when the kids are at outside lessons or playdates,  which makes that the more time-efficient one.

2. Library books are not meant to be consumable. If you’d like to keep checking books out from that system, you can’t mark in/on, tear pages from, or in other way “consume” a library book. Yes, I’m looking at you, Tank.  I enjoy making notes in my books. I like to be able to dog ear a page if I need to. While I discourage margin doodling (Captain Science is a notorious doodler), I want my children to be able to take a note, underline a word or passage, or work through a problem on the page if they need to. We do have some books, like Life of Fred, that I don’t allow marking-up, but most of our curricula is of the consumable variety — meant to be written in. The benefit of a writable/markable curriculum is that it cuts down on the number of binder and folder filled with looseleaf paper, which, incidentally, never actually stays in those darn binders.

3. You’re really not supposed to photocopy that copyrighted material. While I’m not the Queen of all Ethics (I’m sure some of the software on my computer isn’t entirely on the up-and-up), I do feel that one should purchase consumable materials for home use, rather than photocopy the pages that aren’t expressly marked “for reproduction” and use the photocopies. When you do that, you’re reducing the number of sales for that particular publisher/writer, and guess what? If they don’t have enough sales, there won’t be another volume or companion book or edition of that material!

4. My library doesn’t have it. “It” being pretty much anything that I want to use for homeschooling. Sure, I could rearrange my academic plans based on what’s in the library (or available free online), but that seriously limits what materials we can cover. While my public library system has multiple copies of The Well-Trained Mind (various editions) to help a homeschooler get started, it doesn’t have a single book in the Life of Fred series, anything by Michael Clay Thompson, or any of the beautifully-illustrated DK Publishing history books. I can find supplemental books there, but nothing that makes a thorough enough curriculum for my gifted child, who really does need the challenge and creativity of the curricula we have chosen. We went through quite a few options to find what worked for us and not a one of those options was available in our public library system.

5. It only saves you money if you don’t rack up fees. We…um…yeah, kind of misplace library books sometimes. We have a kinda-sorta system on making sure those books don’t get lost, but someone always snags one from the “library books go here” spot and carries it off, then it doesn’t get turned in with the other, or somebody forgets the date the books are due, or somebody assumes somebody else renewed those books whilst s/he was at the library last time, and before you know it, we’ve got $20 in fees on all of our library cards and have to start checking things out under pseudonyms (which takes us right back to that ethics thing, people).  We already do this with our pleasure reading books to the extent that it’s usually cheaper for me to just buy the damn book outright.

6. I’m a book junkie. For those homeschoolers among us who are book junkies, it’s not enough to just read the book. We have to own the book. A big fat bookshelf is ever so much more satisfying than a big fat wallet, don’t you think? I love the smell of books, the feel of books, the lovely weight and size of a trade paperback (as opposed to library-bound hardbacks or thumbed-apart cheap paperbacks).  Books are my dear friends and my precious treasures, but a loaner book from a library can never be more than a passing acquaintance or another man’s rhubarb. I get something of a high from opening a FedEx/UPS box with a new book inside. I derive great pleasure from my shelf of curricula (and even have great dreams of one day arranging it all by topic, like Patchfire’s shelves).

7. Friends make great lending libraries. Patchfire has loaned or gifted me with a great deal of curricula. I, in turn, am prepared to pass along the stuff that didn’t work for us (or is just too young for us) to other homeschoolers.  Patchfire loaned me all of her Greek/Roman materials, and when I give it back to her, it will be accompanied by all the Greek/Roman materials I purchased. Reciprocity amongst a homeschooling community can be one way to cut costs without completely giving up that library. In this way, any book has the potential to help many families. Plus, it makes for a great excuse to get together with other homeschoolers. We’re planning a “Curriculattes” meeting for homeschooling parents to drink coffee and show off or swap curricula. Free or cheap stuff AND a night out? You can’t tell me that isn’t better than a library.

8. Libraries want you to be quiet. Tank, people. I have Tank. I really don’t think I need to explain it any better than that, do I?

9. Sometimes I get a bad case of the gonnas. As in, I’m really gonna make it out to the library this time…if I get around to it. I procrastinate. I put things off.  I drag my feet.  I know this about myself. If I rely on sources outside my home as my primary educational tools, my poor kids are going to be making do with crackers and magazines some weeks, because as much as I think I’m gonna make it to the library each and every week, I know it’s not actually gonna happen. I was also gonna do a lot of art projects and a ton of field trips this year, but without careful pre-planning, that didn’t happen, either. If I were to use the library with great frequency, I’d have to stick very rigidly to that color-coded schedule! I could do it if I had to, but I’d have to overcome a whole passel of gonnas to get there.

10. Have I mentioned I have three kids? I know, I know. Plenty of moms with way more kids than I have pile them into their white conversion van once a week and trot them meekly and quietly into the library to make excellent use of the facilities and resources. I am not those moms, however. Coordinating Captain Science’s need for certain books with Tank’s hands-on curiosity with Babypie’s “you’ve set me down and now I’m going to run off” isn’t my idea of a great time. It’s enough of a pain when we go for pleasure reading.  If I’m trying to locate specific books on the shelves for Captain S., it’s harder to corral Babypie, and Tank is piling up picture books on the reading table, and…ACK! Smrt Mama starts approaching a Smrt Meltdown of her own. Daddyman is usually the one who ends up taking Captain Science (and sometimes Tank) to the library for free reading books, and that works just fine for us.

The long (very long) and short of it is that we haven’t had the need or inclination to rely primarily on the library for our curricula, but that certainly doesn’t mean it couldn’t work for you or anyone else. Learn what your public library system has available to you and develop a schedule and system that allows for regular visits and timely returns of materials…and when you do, please let me know!

That’s what the [Smrt] Homeschooler thinks about using the library. What do you think? How do you and your family use the library as a part of homeschooling?

Do you have a question for the [Smrt] Homeschooler? Email them to
smrtmama@smrtlernins.com

Teaching Tolerance explains the need for such a curriculum:

Students often learn the importance of respecting people of different religions, and of respecting religious beliefs that are different from their own. But what about people who do not hold religious beliefs at all? Too often the right not to believe is excluded from lessons about tolerance.

Yet atheists and others who do not believe in God experience discrimination because of their nonbelief. In this lesson, students learn about episodes of anti-atheist discrimination; and they develop ways to educate others about respecting nonreligious, as well as religious, diversity.

I couldn’t agree more! I’ve seen a fairly high level of expectation of tolerance of their religious views from Christian homeschoolers, but don’t often see the same level of tolerance extended by them towards the beliefs non-religious homeschoolers among us. I think of that absurd “don’t call it ‘Christian mythology’” nonsense from a while back, as one example. The non-religious are expected to treat religious text as sacred and factual, out of “respect” for the Christian homeschoolers…who don’t seem to realize that they’re treating the non-religious homeschoolers with the same level of disrespect they believe they’re being shown.

An interesting read and could be helpful for understanding how to respectfully discourse w/ the homeschooling nonbeliever.

Most of you regular Smrt Mama readers don’t know me, so let me first introduce myself. I’m the Mama, mother of three children: Sweet Pea, 6, Little Bird, almost 3, and Moose, 7 weeks. My elder two are girls and the baby is our first boy.

I live in the northern part of Minnesota in a little town that isn’t near very much. Except woods. Remember reading Little House in the Big Woods where Laura Ingalls Wilder talks about woods that go for days without end? It’s like that, only not in Wisconsin. Anyway, besides the children which quasi-qualify me to blather on about homeschooling, I am part of a family that fits neatly into the religious category: I’m married to a conservative pastor, we lead a pretty traditional family life, we dress modestly, and we teach religion as part of our day. I’m probably the stereotype that you now can picture in your mind! Smrt Mama told me that it’d be interesting to see how religious homeschoolers view the others–the seculars. I decided to take it upon myself to speak for a diverse, divergent community, so here it goes!*

Social graces

Since the most common question homeschoolers seem to get pounded with by others is about the s-word (socialization, or the lack thereof) I thought I’d start with how we religious folk view this. You may have noticed the plethora of religious homeschooling groups and co-ops, many of which require a member to sign a belief statement to get into the club. Why? Why keep out people who don’t agree? There’s some differing viewpoints here, and I’ll try to hit on those that come to mind:

Book Learning

When it comes to science, there are three main groups: Those who believe the world was created in about a week, roughly 6,000 years ago, those who believe evolution and creation co-exist in intelligent design, and those who believed this all evolved over a massive amount of time. There’s even debate, from all sides, if all of these views are science, so it’s no surprise that this is an area that there’s some big disagreements. Most religious homeschoolers kind of shake their heads at secular science and how prevalent it is. Some even have apologetics–defense of the faith–as a part of science class or its own subject.

Relaxation and rigor: it’s probably untrue, but there’s a big feeling that some seculars are way too loosey goosey with academics. And that eventually this’ll negatively impact homeschooling for everybody.

The Future

Goods news, though: despite the worries about your kids cohabiting and living free and easy, I do think most religious homeschoolers think secularly homeschooled kids will shake out better then their publically schooled peers.

I will say that most of my current homeschool chattering is with secular folks who’ve chosen a similar academic path for their schooling. By circumstance, most of my friends are of a reiligious bent similar to my own. I think both groups could have a lot to share…if we could all just play nice in the sand box. And, you know, do things my way.

*I know there are religious homeschoolers who share none of my viewpoints or are deeply offended by my sentiments here. To you: I am deeply, sincerely sorry!

I wish I were capable of preparing my ‘10-’11 curricula that far in advance. It’s not that I’m not capable of making the plans, but I just can’t afford to buy that much curricula that far ahead of time. I can’t buy dozens of supplemental history books, get my language arts stuff two or three levels out, or an extra few books ahead in math six months before they’ll be needed. I’m envious of people who can afford to do that, but I’m not one of them. I see people’s lists for next year and I panic, because they have the books and I don’t. I can’t make too detailed of a plan for next year w/o the books, and I don’t have the books yet.

I know what I want Captain Science to be working on next year. It looks like this:

• Grammar Voyage
• Caesar’s English 2
• World of Poetry
• Essay Voyage
• Practice Voyage
• Complete Life of Fred: Beginning Algebra and Fred’s Home Companion: Beginning Algebra (will begin this semester, work over summer) Life of Fred: Advanced Algebra and Fred’s Home Companion: Advanced Algebra
• Ancient Asian, African, and American history using History: The Definitive Visual Guide**, The Complete Illustrated History of the Aztec & Maya**, Eyewitness: Ancient China**, and more, transitioning into medieval/renaissance history at the end of the year (I have a ton of resources for that, at least)
• Begin Japanese language (probably w/ tutor and whatever books s/he recommends)
• Begin Lively Latin (we put off starting Latin this year)
• Some type of art class and an art appreciation study
• Continue with piano and keyboard

It looks like a great plan and all, but I don’t have most of that stuff yet.  It’s not like we’re taking the summer off from homeschooling, either — we’re doing several subjects over the summer, plus a co-op’d unit study through Pennies for Peace – so while I will be buying books and working on lesson plans over the summer, it won’t ever be something to which I can devote my full attention (like it was the summer before our first year of homeschooling). This wasn’t something I had counted on, the feeling of always being a step behind where I should be. The lazy pre-homeschooling summer and hand-me-down curricula gave me a false sense of the ease and affordability of preparing for a school year. Of course, we’ve bought many, many books since then, so I’m not a total newb, but having to get it all together at once? Having to prepare for the next year while still working on the current year? Never getting a summer totally “off”? Can you blame me for panicking.

It’s a true blue Earnest Mom moment here, folks. I feel like I’m not doing it right and none of Patchfire’s protestations that she’s only getting ready for next year this early because they’re probably moving will convince me that I’m not behind. When you think of me, just picture Jodie Foster.

*I have an anxiety disorder, so I spike a comparably high level of panic over a wide range of things, regardless of whether or not the situation actually warrants it.
**I already have these books, thank goodness!

My county’s public school system (an otherwise well-thought-of system, high scores and all those things one uses to grade a public school system as “good”) has a somewhat ignoble history of dealing with the topic of evolution. Up through the ’90s, the county’s policy was to avoid the topic entirely, so as to avoid “compelling of any student to study the origin of human species,” a stunning example of the separation of church science and state. In 2001, the school system started looking for new science books and new approaches towards evolution (new approaches encouraged, I suspect, by my former biology teacher, Dr. Wesley McCoy, who has testified in favor of evolution at public hearings and federal court — it’s worth noting that Dr. McCoy, when I knew him at least, was also highly active in his church and involved in trying to bridge the gaps between the religious and scientific communities). When the religious community got wind of this shift towards the more scientifically-sound teaching of evolution, they responded with a protest signed by some 2,300 parents (a number which makes up only a small percentage of the parents of the 100,000+ students enrolled in Cobb County schools).

The county, in order to avoid a media mess over the change toward a more evolutionist science text (the horror!), decided the solution was to include this sticker in the new science texts:

This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered.

Approved by
Cobb County Board of Education
Thursday, March 28, 2002

I was lucky to have graduated five years (and my brother two years) prior to this incident, but it still struck a nerve. A small group of religious individuals had put pressure on a public school over the inclusion of secular scientific theory — and had won. To those with a decent understanding of science, “scientific theory” means an explanation based on observation, experimentation, and reasoning, especially one that has been tested and confirmed as a general principle helping to explain and predict natural phenomena. We understand that a “fact” is a single piece of quantifiable data and a “theory” is the means of correlating and interpreting multiple facts. To say that say “evolution is not a fact, but a theory,” is to say “a duck is not a wing, but a bird.” There’s a twisted degree of limited accuracy there (the wing is not the whole duck, nor is the duck nothing but a wing), but a fundamental lack of understanding of the relationship between evolutionary theory and the factual existence of evolution (the wing is one necessary component of the whole duck; the wing doesn’t exist without the duck). Evolution is a theory…that evolution itself exists is a fact. Trying to use the “just a theory, not a fact” argument to discount the scientific validity of evolution only demonstrates one’s lack of understanding of the basic principles of empirical evidence-based science and of current modern evolutionary synthesis. Or, as one writer put it, “Evolution isn’t just a theory; it’s triumphantly a theory!”

In 2004, plaintiffs Jeffrey Selman, Kathleen Chapman, Jeff Silver, Paul Mason, and terry Jackson, who all had children in the school system, brought suit claiming that the sticker violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. 2005, a judged ruled on the case (Selman v. Cobb County School District), finding that the stickers violated the Lemon test (which details the requirements for legislation concerning religion):

1. The government’s action must have a legitimate secular purpose;
2. The government’s action must not have the primary effect of either advancing or inhibiting religion; and
3. The government’s action must not result in an “excessive entanglement” of the government and religion.

The stickers failed the Lemon test because they gave the appearance that “the School Board [had] sided with the proponents of religious theories of origin in violation of the Establishment Clause.” The board’s choice of language — referring to evolution as “a theory, not a fact,” a well-known tactic of evolution-opponents, using “theory” in the colloquial sense to mean an opinion or guess — was ultimately the hill on which the battle was lost. Judge Cooper, who heard the case, wrote: “…the distinction of evolution as a theory rather than a fact is the distinction that religiously motivated individuals have specifically asked school boards to make in the most recent anti-evolution movement.”

The case was appealed and ultimately settled out of court in favor of the plaintiffs, at which time Cobb County School District state it would not order the placement of “any stickers, labels, stamps, inscriptions, or other warnings or disclaimers bearing language substantially similar to that used on the sticker that is the subject of this action.” No stickers getting in the way of children learning about evolution in public school…at least, not in Cobb County.

The National Center for Science Education, the ACLU, and Smrt Mama called this a win.

The full text of Selman v. Cobb County can be read at Talk Origins Archive, a “collection of articles and essays that explore the creationism/evolution controversy from a mainstream scientific perspective.” You can find a list of additional resources on teaching evolution to your pre-collegiate students here.

Once there was a boy, living in a town, and he ran so confidently and fast during races that everyone who saw him run would say, “Wow!” One day, in a racing tournament, he participated and raced into the finals. as soon as the starter gun fired, he and his three competitors took off. He was in first place neck-to-neck with another guy. 100 feet…50 feet…he was now in first place alone. 25 feet…10…15…10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-0! He won the tournament for the 34th time, and felt great holding up the golden trophy.